Another one from Mr Oliver - simple, delicious, looks and tastes great. Sea bass is a wonderful fish, soft and delicate (and not too fishy!) you can buy fillets or get whole fish and fillet them yourself (haven’t tried this but probably not that difficult - if you have a fishmonger they will do this for you).
Ingredients (for 2)
- 2-4 fillets of sea bass (you want about 200g each so depends on size)
- 2 lemons (zest & juice)
- green beans (top & tailed)
- handful of asparagus (english preferred if in season)
- handful of mint (quite unbelievably easy to grow, but keep in pots or will take over your garden)
- 4-8 rashers streaky bacon (must be thin or won’t crisp up)
- glass of chardonnay (or similar)
- salt & pepper
- butter (optional)
- couple of swigs of olive oil
Pre-heat oven to 250C, score fillets and put into sealable plastic bag (sandwich bag or similar) with lemon juice and zest from 1 lemon and some olive oil. Leave for 10 mins.
Meanwhile par-boil asparagus and beans for about 3 mins (until a little soft). Then drain in a colander.
Mash up mint with a little olive oil and lemon juice (about 1/2 lemon’s worth - rest for serving) in a pestle and mortar.
Empty the asparagus and beans into a large roasting tray, add most of the mint sauce and swish around so everything is nicely coated. Wrap the asparagus and beans with the bacon (nice & snug) and arrange around the tray leaving some gaps for the fillets. Take the fillets out of the bag and fill in the gaps (you don’t want the fish sitting on top of the bacon wraps or they won’t get crisp). Pour the wine over this and season with salt & pepper.
Cook for 10 mins until everything is crisp and golden. Give the tray a good shake, add a few small knobs of butter (optional) and take to table to serve with remaining mint sauce and lemon juice. Make sure you use the wine and mint sauce from the tray.
and arrange in a large roasting tray (this is the fun bit). Drizzle over most of the mint sauce
